- Want to go fishing? - The fish are frozen.
Look at that car... Is it not neat? It must be a Ford.
No, it is not a Ford.
- Then what it is? - I do not know, but it is not a Ford.
- Leonard, what are you doing? - What does it look like?
Somebody might be coming.
No one is coming.
What is wrong?
Leonard, honey. Better get dressed. Your breakfast is ready.
We will begin with a history test.
Keep your eyes on your own papers, and at recess bring your books to me.
Hi, Mrs. Lowe. Can Leonard come out today?
- No, I am sorry. Not today - How about tomorrow?
- He will not be well then either. - When will he be well?
I do not know.
Thank you for coming by.
- Excuse me... - You have to ask her.
Bainbridge Hospital, can I help you? Dr. Franklin and Dr. Tyler -
- are in a meeting. Can I take a message?
I am Dr. Malcolm Sayer, I have an appointment.
Take a seat, please... Bainbridge Hospital, may I help you?
When you say people, you mean living people?
I apply for a research position in the neurology lab.
We have an x-ray room.
This is a chronic hospital. The position is for staff neurologist.
- You will be working with people. - A doctor, Doctor.
- Any patients at the Carmel Institute? - Earthworms.
Sorry?
It was an immense project. I was to extract 1 decigram myelin -
- from 4 tons of earthworms.
I worked on that for 5 years, everyone else said it could not be done.
- It cannot. - I know that now. I proved it.
Maybe before... at St Thomas?
All research?
We are understaffed...
He has never worked with human beings...
Excuse me, you are looking for someone with a clinical background.
As much as I need a job, there must be 100 more suitable applicants.
How about medical school?
You could not graduate without some clinical experience.
You took a pulse, a temperature. You did diagnosis.
There you have it, then.
You do want the job, do you not?
This way, Doc... You spend much time in a chronic hospital?
- You would remember. - I guess not, then.
We have M.S., Tourette syndrome, Parkinson's disease -
- some of them we have not got a name for.
- What are they waiting for? - Nothing.
- How will they get well? - They will not. They are chronic.
We call it the garden because all we do is feed and water them.
Mr. Kean? Can I ask...
I was born 1911 in Kingsbridge, New York. I came here in July 1955.
Prior to that, I was at Brooklyn Psychiatric Center.
Prior to that, I was a person.
It gets easier.
You do not think it will, but it does.
No, Buttercup... Go to your house.
Good morning, Doctor... I have a new arrival for you.
She was brought in late last night. Here is her file.
Hello, I am Dr. Sayer.
Do you know where you are?
Can you hear me?
Medical insurance?
Her name is Lucy Fishman. She was found with her sister -
- many days after her sister died.
She has no living relatives. She has always been as she is now.
With no response or comprehension. And yet...
A reflex.
If she batted it away, but she did not. As you can see, she caught it.
It is still a reflex.
If you were right, I would agree.
It is as if, having lost her own will, she borrows the will of the ball.
- The will of the ball? - Excuse me.
You are trying to make a good impression, that is it, right?
You are still settling in.
Miss Costello, see to it that Dr. Sayer's waiting patients -
- are rescheduled for tomorrow.
Borrows the will of the ball?
That is great.
Okay, thank you.
Let us know if she catches anything else.
I will be fired. It is all right, I will go back to school.
Did I forget something?
No, I wanted to say that I preferred your explanation.
I will look after things for you until you have settled in.
- Good night, Doctor. - Thank you.
- Hello, I am Dr. Sayer. - I am Waheedah.
- How are you today? - Fine, thank you...
Yes, sorry. What form? Yes, I will hold.
Okay. Three, one, two.
Thank you. Bye.
Hello.
- Yipee! We are in orbit. - Now we can try being weightless.
Let us celebrate with delicious Nestle's Quick.
Nestle's chocolate flavor is out of this world.
Hello up there, time to recharge with delicious Nestle's Quick.
Lucy...
You are out...
Anthony, would you help me... move this?
Excuse me.
Lucy, you are almost there.
Here is the water, Lucy.
I wonder why your nails grow so fast?
It must be all that Jello they give you.
Jello, Jello, day after day.
Red Jello, yellow Jello, every day Jello.
I forgot to tell you, Mrs. Cooper passed away. Remember her?
She was nice. Always a kind word.
Her dog I could have done without.
- Excuse me? - Hello.
Does he ever speak to you?
- Of course not. Not in words. - He speaks to you in other ways?
How do you mean?
- You do not have children. - No.
If you did, you would know.
It says "atypical schizophrenia".
"Atypical hysteria", this one.
"Atypical nerve impairment".
"No change since last examination. "
"No change or therapy recommended. "
Very nice.
This one is "No change", dated 9/11/44.
That is 25 years.
At a point all these atypical somethings ought to amount to a typical something.
But a typical what?
Doctor, do you want to go for a cup of coffee or something?
Tea?
Normally, I would say yes, but I made other plans.
- Some other time. - Yes.
"Encephalitis lethargica".
Where is it?
Sorry, I thought someone had left the light on.
I found the connection. They all survived encephalitis -
- years before they came here. See? In the 1920's.
- Is it not wonderful? - Yes, I will come back later.
How many have you found there?
Five. And I believe there are more.
How are they?
As you described them back then: "Insubstantial as ghosts".
Only I guess... many of them were children back then.
Yes, children who fell asleep.
Most died during the acute stage of the illness.
Those who survived... who awoke -
- seemed fine, as if nothing had happened.
We just did not realize how much the infection had damaged the brain.
Years went by. Five, ten, fifteen -
- before these strange, neurological symptoms would appear.
But they did.
I began to see them in the early 1930's.
Old people brought in by their children.
Young people brought in by their parents.
They could no longer dress themselves or feed themselves.
They could no longer speak in most cases.
Certain families went mad.
People who were normal -
- were now -
- elsewhere.
What is it like to be them? What are they thinking?
They are not.
The virus did not spare their higher faculties.
- We know that for a fact? - Yes.
- Because? - Because the alternative is unthinkable.
I am all for fixing this place up, but, what are we doing?
I have a hunch.
What stops Lucy from reaching the fountain?
Nothing.
Exactly, the visual field just stops. There is no pattern.
Nothing to compel her to keep going.
- So, we are making something. - Exactly.
She is looking out the...
- I want to know more about your son. - Certainly.
Something was wrong with his hands. He could not write anymore.
He could not do the work.
I should take him out of school, they said. He was eleven.
Slowly, he got worse.
He would call me and I would come in and he was sitting at his desk -
- in a trance. One hour, two hours... Then he would be okay again.
One day I came home from work and found him in his bed.
He kept saying, "Mum, mum?"... His arm was like this, reaching.
"What do you want, Leonard?"
He never spoke again. It was as if he disappeared.
Later, that year, I took him to Bainbridge.
It was... November 14, 1939.
He was twenty years old.
What did he do for those nine years in this room?
He read. He loved to read. He read all the time.
Really?
That was all he could do.
That is enough.
All right, Leonard. We are finished.
Nothing, nothing, nothing and... Nothing.
- It is one of your statues. - Exactly.
Pass the salt.
- What about this. - What do you mean? It is a strobe.
You are wrong. All of this before is the strobe.
This is me saying his name to him.
Excuse me.
Straight down the middle. Home it in there!
I can catch the ball. Throw me the ball!
Is this all of them? Bring them in here with the others.
I should have given David his divorce. I thought he wanted to be a father...
The patients have been given their morning medication.
Dr. Sayer hoped you had some free time. Come with me, please.
This is a beautiful aria. Watch them closely for any reaction.
"Call me Ishmael. "
"Some years ago, never mind how long precisely, -
- having little money, and nothing in particular to interest me on shore. "
I know you can hear me. Try to respond when I speak your name.
It is not just any music. It has to be right for them.
It is as if they are only moved by music that moves them.
I have not found anything that moves Bert, yet.
They sit there all day, if I let them.
I have to play the first card.
Leonard... L...
This is Frank. Help me get him to his feet.
There is something else that reaches him... Human contact.
Stand over there for a minute.
He cannot walk without me. If I let go of him, he will fall.
I will not let you fall.
But... he will walk with me anywhere.
It is like the ball, it is my will he is borrowing.
The will of another human being.
I will begin by moving the pointer to L for Leonard.
When I sense you move the pointer, I will stop and you will take over.
Do you understand?... All right. I will begin.
No, maybe I did not make myself clear. My fault, I...
L... Good, good. Now the E.
E, good.
S...
P...
You are spelling something else.
"His gaze, from staring through the bars, -
- has grown so weary that it can take in nothing more.
For him, it is as though there were a thousand bars -
- and behind the thousand bars, no world.
As he paces in cramped circles, over and over, -
- his powerful strides are like a ritual dance around a centre -
- where a great will stands paralyzed.
At times the curtains of the eye lift without a sound and a shape enters, -
- slips through the tightened silence of the shoulders, -
- reaches the heart, and dies. "
Have you heard of a drug called L-dopa? It is a synthetic dopamine.
Yes, for Parkinson's patients...
Why?
Excuse me, sorry!
100 years would pass before modern neuropathology -
- would allow us to locate the damage in the Parkinsonian brain.
With our development of the drug L-dopa, we can for the first time promise -
- the Parkinsonian patient a more normal life by administering L...
I am very curious about this drug. Have you come across anyone who...
- Excuse me, Dr... - Sayer.
Have you come across any patients with encephalitis?
After I am through, Dr. Sayer. If you would not mind.
As I was saying... by administering L-dopa.
Do you think an extreme Parkinsonian tremor -
- would appear as no tremor at all?
- Are you talking to me? - Oh, yes.
Imagine you accelerated a hand tremor to the point of immobility.
Imagine a patient with all the Parkinson symptoms accelerated.
The hand tremor, the head bobbing, quickening of speech.
Might they not cave in on themselves and turn a person into stone?
I do not know. Maybe.
- Do you think L-dopa would help? - Dr. Sayer, right?
I am a chemist, you are the physician. I will leave it to you to do the damage.
Freud believed in miracles, prescribing cocaine as candy.
We all believed in Cortisone until our patients went psychotic on it.
- And now it is L-dopa? - I think it is too soon to say that.
With all due respect, I think it is way too soon to say that.
Let the chemists do the damage, Doctor.
But I...
Dr. Kaufman, did you read this case? "New drug lets Palsy patients eat Jello. "
Yes, I read them all. Dutifully, soberly. All 30 cases had mild Parkinson's.
Your "Parkies", if that is what they are, have not moved in decades.
Perhaps you should look at it again, sir.
You know better than to make such a leap.
You want a connection; that does not mean there is one.
What I believe, what I know, is that they are alive inside.
How do you know that? Because they catch tennis balls?
I know it.
- How many did you think could have it? - All of them.
Some... One.
One.
With the family's consent, signed.
Leonard has Parkinson's disease?
No... His symptoms are like Parkinson's disease -
- but then again, they are not.
What will the medicine do for him?
I do not know what it will do for him, if anything at all.
What do you think it will do?
I am not sure, it was designed for a totally different disorder.
What do you hope it will do?
I hope... it will bring him back from wherever he is.
- To what? - To the world.
What is there here for him after all these years?
You... You are here.
All of it, please.
- At 200 mg, he showed no response. - Maybe the juice's acid neutralized it.
- Maybe he needs more. - Maybe he needs less.
I will try it in milk.
500 mg.
- I will call if there is any change. - Yes.
Thank you.
It is quiet.
It is late. Everyone is asleep.
- I am not asleep. - No, you are awake.
May I?
Me.
Leonard, there is someone here to see you.
Mum... Mum!
- My name is Eleanor. - Eleanor.
- It is a pleasure to meet you. - It is a pleasure to meet you.
- Ladies? - Now, what did I do?
Oh, my goodness.
How do you do, sir? My name is Margaret.
Beth.
Anthony. How are you?
Great man. How are you?
Great, too.
- Did you meet him? - Did he not look good?
I could not deal with losing 30 years of my life, could you?
He does realize it, does he not?
Turn this way, please. It is a camera called a Polaroid. Thank you.
Takes a picture in less than a minute. Amazing.
Now, we could try this.
Splendid... I would like you to walk to the end of the room.
Ready? Go.
Very good.
And back now.
That was very quick... Let me get some more film.
You have to at least lay down. You need the rest.
I am afraid to close my eyes. If I close my eyes I will...
You will sleep. When you wake up in the morning, it will be the next morning.
I promise.
Baby's boat, a silver moon, sailing in the sky.
Baby is fishing for a dream, fishing near and far.
Sail, baby, sail -
- out upon that sea.
Only do not forget to sail back again to me.
What a wonderful place the Bronx has become.
- That is my school. - Really?
- Is that classical? - You can pick any type of music.
- What is that? - It is rock 'n' roll.
Come on in.
No, something happened while you were away. It is called pollution.
Leonard, that is not wading, that is swimming!
I do not know if the hospital is covered for this.
- Come on! - No.
Leonard, the tide is coming in.
That is the Periodic Table of Elements -
- I can date my introduction to science by that.
It is wonderful, really... It is the universe at its essence.
You have your alkaline metals. You have your halogens, your inert gases.
Every element has its place in that order. You cannot change that.
They are secure, no matter what.
You are not married?
Me? No... I am not very good with people.
I never have been, Leonard... I like them.
I wish I had more than a rudimentary understanding of them.
Maybe, if they were less unpredictable.
Eleanor would disagree with you.
- Eleanor? - Miss Costello.
She has spoken to you about me?
What did she say?
That you were a kind man. That you care very much for people.
I would like to put the others on the drug. I realize this may be expensive.